Arabesk

Cohen shrugged. Then turning quickly he walked smartly out of the room without another word. As he disappeared, Mina let go of the breath she had been holding and then kissed the baby's head. Whatever Madame had said to Cohen had certainly shocked him. But in the circumstances that was probably a very good thing.

As soon as Suleyman's car disappeared down her drive, Tansu's demeanour changed completely. Whereas her mood had been one of soft conciliation and even at times tearful distress while the inspector was in her house, his departure provoked something far more malevolent.

'I can't believe you agreed to speak that posh boy's words without any discussion,' she snarled at a grey-faced Erol. 'We're stars. We don't just get pushed around!'

'He is a policeman, Tansu,' Latife said as she put a calming hand on her sister's shoulder.

'When I want your opinion, I'll ask for it!' Tansu roared and then hurled herself down at Erol's feet. 'You just say whatever you feel you need to in order to get Merih back, my darling. Don't worry about whether the police are there.'

Had Erol Urfa had any emotional resources left with which to respond he would probably have stroked Tansu's head as was his custom. But he was like stone now. Anxiety and sleeplessness had taken their toll and when he did respond it was with only a very weak smile.

As Tansu covered Erol's leaden legs with tear-stained kisses, Latife felt that the time had come for her to leave. There was no point in talking to either of them in their current moods and besides, if Tansu as she so often did managed to provoke Erol to lovemaking in spite of his own feelings, she did not want to be around. She strode out of the room, her face set and grave. But when she was once again by the swimming pool her mood lightened. She picked up the book she had been reading before the policeman arrived and, with a smile, resumed her studies.

By five o'clock that afternoon the results of the fingerprint analyses had come through. They necessitated the reappearance of Cengiz Temiz in Interview Room 3. A very tired-looking Suleyman observed the trembling man sitting opposite him with something between odium and pity. Çöktin, who sat beside his boss, leafed briefly through the documents before looking up again as Suleyman spoke.

'So, Mr Temiz,' Suleyman said, 'I ask you again, where were you on the evening of the eleventh of August nineteen ninety-nine?'

Cengiz Temiz just carried on shaking, his mouth lolling open, soundlessly.

'I do need some sort of answer from you, Cengiz,' Suleyman continued in what he hoped was a rather more conciliatory tone.

Cengiz Temiz's small eyes darted rapidly between the two faces in front of him. Although he did not feel able to admit it, he wanted to go to the toilet quite badly.

'I didn't hurt Mrs Ruya,' he said as he pushed his hands between his legs and leaned forward.

As this was the first thing that Suleyman personally had actually heard Temiz say directly to him, it was quite a breakthrough. It also gave him the opportunity to tackle the man regarding more recently acquired evidence. Before he began he tried to bear in mind what Zelfa Halman had told him about speaking to people like Cengiz. It also briefly passed through his mind what the psychiatrist had said about the chances of someone like Cengiz being able to both plan and execute quite a complex murder. In the face of the evidence, however, he had to put that to one side.

'Cengiz,' he said leaning forward in order to show the man his fingers, 'do you remember when one of the officers downstairs asked you to put your fingers in ink and then press them down onto paper? It made finger marks or prints.'

'Mmm.' It was a grunt without any accompanying movements. Suleyman assumed that it meant Cengiz understood.

'Well,' he said, 'what we do is, we look at your prints and the prints of some other people and we try to match them with finger marks our forensic people collect at the scene of the crime.'

Nothing. Suleyman looked across at Çöktin who, for some reason, was smiling at Cengiz Temiz. When Suleyman cleared his throat, the younger officer changed his expression.

'Now it seems,' Suleyman continued, 'that your fingerprints match some of those at the scene of Mrs Urfa's murder. Not that you are alone in this. We've also found prints from Mr Urfa, baby Merih, and Mrs Urfa's prints on lots of things including kitchen equipment and her pen. The problem we have with you is that only your prints have been found on Mrs Urfa's body. Forensic have found your marks on the lady's spectacles and on a gold bangle round her wrist. Do you know what I'm saying here, Cengiz, or-'

'Didn't hurt Mrs Ruya! Didn't do it!'

'Didn't do what, Cengiz?' Suleyman insisted. 'What didn't you do?'

Once again the silence rolled in across the terrified wastes of Cengiz Temiz's face.

'Look, Cengiz,' Çöktin put in, 'if you didn't hurt Mrs Ruya or if what happened was an accident then you don't have to be frightened, do you?'

'When people die people get hung.'

'Not now. People do go to prison but… Look, Cengiz, if you didn't kill Mrs Ruya then just tell us when you touched her and-'

'She was cold after…'

'She was cold after what, Cengiz?' Suleyman asked, feeling his heart racing with the anticipation of one who knows he might be on the verge of a breakthrough. 'After…'

'Must go to the toilet now.'

'Yes, all right, but first-'

'Now.'

Çöktin, who was much less excited about what Cengiz might be about to say than Suleyman, said, ‘I think you ought to let him go now, sir.'

'Yes, in a-'

'Now!' Cengiz's face was really quite contorted. As he grimaced and gummed his way through a succession of expressions, Suleyman, who had not noticed this need in his prisoner before, lost valuable seconds in argument.

'This urgency is really very sudden, Cengiz,' he said, 'in view of what we have been talking about.'

'I think it's all part of his condition, whatever it is,' Çöktin whispered into Suleyman's ear. 'I think you'd better let him go.'

'Yes, but-'

It was then that the sound of running water accompanied by deep, humiliated sobs were heard coming from Cengiz's large sad frame. Although unable to understand the more subtle aspects of life's diversity, he did know that in this horrible, dirty little room with policemen firing questions at him he was once again in trouble that would cause him pain. And this time, he knew, they would not just send him home when they had finished their questions. This time they were going to keep him.

Tansu stood on the very edge of the cliff, her eyes streaming with tears. Then with a flick of her proud head she turned to the man wearing some sort of foreign uniform who stood beside her and spat, 'I would rather die than be your woman!'

And with that she, or rather a stuntwoman, launched herself into the deep blue abyss below.

'Singers should never act,' Çetin Ìkmen said as he lit a new cigarette from the butt of his last smoke. 'Elvis Presley stands as a warning to us all.'

'Oh, I enjoyed his films,' Fatma said as she passed briefly in front of the screen herding a reluctant child towards the bathroom.

'None of us is perfect,' her husband muttered as he watched a picture of a group of young army conscripts flash up on the screen. Erol Urfa performing his duty for the Republic.

'You know, Fatma,' he called out over both the sound of the television and the running water from the bathroom, 'if I wanted to know when Tansu Hanim was born or where Erol Urfa comes from I wouldn't have the faintest idea from this programme.'

'She's a little shy about her age,' Fatma yelled back. 'It's why she chooses to change what Allah has given her.'

'The plastic surgery?'

'Yes.' With dripping hands she re-entered the living room and stood for a moment, her hands on her hips. 'Have you seen Bulent yet?'

Ìkmen's face darkened. 'Only from the balcony.'

Fatma raised her eyes towards heaven. Then changing the subject once again she said, 'Did I hear you say that Kleopatra Polycarpou is finally dying?'